1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to a method and components for cultivation, and more specifically to a method and components for increasing plant yields while decreasing the associated costs of time, labor growing space, fertilizer, fumigation, water, etc., and also decreasing the associated environmental impact.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The commercial production of plants and plant material for consumption is plagued with many difficulties associated with natural botanical characteristics and the environment in which the plants are grown. Proper horticultural practices to minimize these difficulties and maximize plant growth and production are necessary to ensure commercially viable production.
Commercial farms have evolved to grow plants in organized rows. The rows help facilitate the planting, feeding, trimming, feeding, watering, maintenance and harvesting of the plants or food products grown by the plants. Conventional growing practices often utilize flood-type irrigation techniques and mass spraying of chemicals used to fumigate and fertilize.
Flood irrigation and mass spraying, besides being wasteful of water and chemical resources, has the potential to damage surface soils and both ground water and surface water sources. Irrigating floodwater applied to fields promotes erosion and promotes run-off of fertilizers and pesticides into water sources. In arid environments flood irrigation often leads to soil mineralization associated with the buildup of surface salts. Flood irrigation also creates large swings over time in the amount of moisture in the soil, which stresses the plants.
Typical agricultural berms that have previously been in use do not reach a height greater than about 12 inches and a width at the base of about 2½ feet. Typical berms are used to slightly raise the plants to protect them from direct and damaging contact with water from flood irrigation. While these berms protect the plants from flood irrigation, these berms do not provide a sufficient soil zone for the roots of the plant (especially trees, bushes, vines and other plants with deep developing roots) to develop above a level where harmful nematodes occur.
Agricultural fields, especially those in continuous use, year after year, are usually infested with harmful nematodes that attack the roots of plants that are planted. Development of nematode resistant plant varieties and crop rotation have lessened the problem of nematode infestation to a limited extent. A field is typically fumigated before planting with a substance such as methyl bromide in an effort to kill the nematodes, but this also has achieved limited success since the harmful nematodes reside approximately 12 inches below the surface of the soil. The use of methyl bromide is also being severely restricted or banned completely in some regions due to adverse environmental effects associated with its use. Methyl bromide and other fumigants also kill many of the organisms in the soil that are beneficial to plants.
Furthermore, in traditional flood irrigation a significant percentage of water applied to a field is lost either through evaporation to the air or migration below the effective root zone of the plants. This technique wastes water resources, as does more advanced sprinkler techniques, although to a lesser extent.
In the fruit tree cultivation industry it is not uncommon to paint the trunks of matures trees white in order to prevent the tree from becoming “sunburned”. Overheating of trees has long been recognized as a problem, but providing newly transplanted trees with protection from the sun has generally been ignored.
Young trees and vines transplanted from a nursery to a field are typically provided with some sort of conventional covering such as a wrap, tube or collar. The conventional wisdom in the industry is that these devices provide winter protection from the cold and a physical barrier to plant predators, pests, and herbicides as well as environmental factors such as windburn or frost damage. In order to achieve the desired winter warming advantage, conventional coverings are provided in direct contact with the plant, and the upper surface of the soil.
For example, when a young citrus tree is transplanted from a nursery to a field, at about 2-4 feet in height and ¼ to ½ inch in trunk diameter, a protective collar is placed around the trunk. Trees are typically transplanted in the spring, and the conventional collars may remain around the young plants for several years. However, these coverings have adverse affects during summer that are detrimental to the development of the plants. The covering increases the internal temperature within the coverings by as much as 20° F. which stresses the plant. Tubes and collars used for this purpose are slightly driven into the ground to provide a “mini-greenhouse” effect within the covering. In an effort to prevent plants from getting too cold in the winter the covering remedy has actually created an undue heat stress on the plants in the summer, either severely reducing plant growth or possibly killing the plant.